Case Citator › Pebble Beach Co. v. Tour 18 I, Ltd.

Pebble Beach Co. v. Tour 18 I, Ltd.

Is it still good law? What later courts have actually done to this case.

Abrogated
Court
Fifth Circuit
Citation
155 F.3d 526
Decided
Confirmed treatments
1
Flagged citations read
36 of 36
Citing cases (total)
36
Treatment dates
2001
Abrogated
A reviewed court treats this case as abrogated by later authority. Pebble Beach Co. v. Tour 18 I, Ltd. has been abrogated in part; the confirmed treatment is listed below. All 36 flagged citations have been read.
More on how this was screened

The Supreme Court's functionality ruling displaced Pebble Beach's use of competitive necessity as the primary test for functional trade dress. The Fifth Circuit recognized this effect in Eppendorf-Netheler-Hinz GmbH v. Ritter GmbH. The Supreme Court later vacated the Federal Circuit's contrary willfulness ruling in Romag Fasteners, Inc. v. Fossil, Inc. (2020).

Every treatment on this page is written from the citing opinion itself, with a verbatim quote, never copied from a commercial citator. A citation flagged by our screen but not shown here was read and found not to weaken this case.

36 later cases cite Pebble Beach Co. v. Tour 18 I, Ltd.; 36 of those citations sat close to treatment language and were flagged for reading, and all of them have been read. Citations that did not sit near treatment language were not flagged and were not read one by one, so a court that weakened this case without using any of that language would not appear here.

Relying on Pebble Beach Co. v. Tour 18 I, Ltd.?

This page shows what later courts did to it. Ask about your specific facts and see whether it still carries your argument, with citations you can check.

Treatments

Abrogated

  • The Supreme Court displaced Pebble Beach's functionality test, which made competitive necessity the primary inquiry for functional trade dress.

    TrafFix Devices, Inc. v. Marketing Displays, Inc. · Supreme Court of the United States · filed

    The Court of Appeals in the instant case seemed to interpret this language to mean that a necessary test for functionality is “whether the particular product configuration is a competitive necessity.” 200 F. 3d, at 940. See also Vomado, 58 F. 3d, at 1507 (“Functionality, by contrast, has been defined both by our circuit, and more recently by the Supreme Court, in terms of competitive need”). This was incorrect as a comprehensive definition.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

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